Chapter 4: Fear

He Jueyun immediately asked the same question as the viewers.

He Jueyun: But you said that when Xu You hit you today, your Suicide Progress didn’t change.

Qiong Cang: Yeah.

Qiong Cang: Maybe Wang Dongyan finally saw through the awkwardness of romance and returned to the embrace of science. After all, the photos were all taken before Zhou Nansong’s suicide.

On the other end, He Jueyun was taken aback once more.

Just which school of dry humor did she graduate from?

He Jueyun: …?

Qiong Cang: Unless she has some special fetish, she probably wouldn’t fall for a guy who maliciously bullies her. Besides, Xu You’s dislike of Wang Dongyan is very real and clear. This suggests that Xu You’s bullying of her likely only started recently, and the reason it began is directly related to her suicidal tendencies. Wang Dongyan is under immense mental stress and has no energy left to care about what her classmates or Xu You think of her.

Qiong Cang: Of course, other possibilities can’t be completely ruled out. It could also be that the Suicide Progress doesn’t show decimal changes.

Her train of thought was very clear, and her analysis was quite objective, devoid of any intellectual arrogance or dogmatism.

Qiong Cang was a bit more reliable than He Jueyun had imagined, a slight departure from the rumors.

After a moment, Qiong Cang apparently reflected on it and sent another rather half-hearted text.

Qiong Cang: Oh, or maybe it was just their way of flirting to get each other’s attention, and I overreacted and turned it into assault. No wonder Xu You looked like he’d seen a ghost at the time. After all, I don’t really understand high school romance.

He Jueyun: …

It was, in a word, suffocating.

.

In the Live Stream Room, a group of straight guys and girls saw the text and finally caught on, suddenly feeling incredibly exhausted.

“I get it. Normal girl gets hit: teary-eyed and aggrieved. Boy: ‘Okay, okay, my bad. Let me buy you dinner to apologize, alright?’ Steel-straight girl¹: ‘I’ll fucking rip your head off!’ Boy: ‘Holy shit!’ 【Perfect】【Smile】”

“The elements of romance: civility, subtlety, and acting aggrieved.”

“This will be on the test, everyone. Please take notes.”

“This realization is actually kind of sad.”

“This ship is doomed, guys. Give up. There’s no hope for this CP.”

.

He Jueyun waited for a long time, but there was no follow-up. She had just stopped abruptly, without even a word of goodbye.

He Jueyun: And then?

Qiong Cang seemed to have lost interest in chatting, only replying after four or five minutes.

Qiong Cang: It’s just a minor discovery. What ‘and then’ do you want?

He Jueyun: Predictions and inferences based on the current information. Boldly hypothesize, carefully verify.

Qiong Cang: I’ve verified it. I just don’t know what kind of hypothesis counts as bold.

Qiong Cang’s predictive analysis of romantic issues had never been very accurate. The brains of people in love seemed to take bizarre turns, and she could never predict their next ridiculous stunt or where the turning point lay.

Qiong Cang: Dude, are you single?

He Jueyun choked. He felt targeted.

His strange hesitation sent that exact signal to Qiong Cang.

Qiong Cang: I get it. I won’t ask you then.

He Jueyun: …Thanks for your consideration.

Qiong Cang: No need to be polite.

He Jueyun felt his chest tighten again.

She really didn’t know the meaning of the word.

He Jueyun put down his phone and returned to the task at hand.

He still had evidence gathered from the previous two suicide cases to go through, such as surveillance footage.

He was already physically and mentally exhausted from reviewing statements and videos, feeling as if his eyes were about to dry out from staring at the screen.

After he had been working for half an hour, his phone screen lit up again.

Qiong Cang: Here’s another clue for you.

Qiong Cang: I just looked through Wang Dongyan’s exercise books and textbooks for various subjects. She seems to have been a diligent student. Early on, her homework was written clearly, with complete calculations, and an accuracy rate of over 90%. However, starting from March 23rd, her homework clearly began to get sloppy, with brief processes and no calculations, and the error rate for some exercises rose significantly. Based on my experience, she copied several of her assignments. This indicates that Wang Dongyan experienced some kind of incident on March 23rd that caused a major psychological shock.

Qiong Cang: Zhou Nansong’s suicide was on March 25th. So Wang Dongyan’s suicidal anxiety had already begun before Zhou Nansong jumped off the building. Whether the reasons they ultimately chose suicide are the same remains to be verified.

The viewers who were still chatting casually were instantly pulled back to the main topic, feeling as if they had been hit over the head.

“Holy shit?! Does this count as a major discovery? Right, you can actually use homework to map out the timeline. She’s a genius!”

“So it’s still about silencing them. A few people found out things they shouldn’t have. Because Zhou Nansong hated Wang Dongyan, she deliberately dragged her down with her. The plot might go in a supernatural direction, or it might go in the direction of a science documentary². I’m really a genius, hahaha!”

“…How is her process and steps so different from the previous players? This clue clearly skipped a stage. The previous Player seemed to have skipped class for three days before getting the clue from the Homeroom Teacher through dialogue.”

“This Instance has too many misleading clues; it’s easy to fall into a trap. The NPCs are also very good at lying. So her directly checking physical evidence is the most correct way.”

“I feel ashamed that I actually dared to question a high-level Player with a score of 92. I was wrong, but I’ll do it again next time. “

Not to mention the viewers, even He Jueyun was shaken.

He Jueyun: The two time periods are very close. Are you sure there’s no mistake?

Qiong Cang: Positive. Inferred from the progress of the science classes, the recitation dates of Chinese texts, and the English dictation annotations. There’s no way all three are wrong.

He Jueyun: Isn’t this very important information? Why was it just mentioned in passing?

Qiong Cang: Before there is more evidence, no valid conclusion can be drawn. Clues that I haven’t figured out only deserve to be mentioned in passing. Is there a problem with that?

Qiong Cang: Aren’t I the one carrying you through this? It’s fine as long as I know.

He Jueyun fell into a mental silence.

He Jueyun: No problem. Just wanted to ask, are there any other unimportant clues you can share while you’re at it?

Qiong Cang: Not really, I guess?

Qiong Cang: I got a bag of orange-flavored hard candies today.

He Jueyun replied quickly. Yet, his focus was just as unconventional.

He Jueyun: The candies, send them to forensics?

Qiong Cang: No need.

He Jueyun: Why?

Qiong Cang: I ate them.

He Jueyun: Alive?

Qiong Cang: .

He Jueyun: “…”

“Wait, is chatting in decreasing order a thing now? Is typing that hard?”

“I can’t take these two…”

“Would typing one more word kill them?”

“I love watching them talk. One of them always switches channels out of nowhere. How do they communicate across dimensions so seamlessly?”

·

After Qiong Cang finished her banter with He Jueyun, noisy chatter echoed from outside the dorm. The students were returning from evening self-study³.

Their dorm was on the first floor, which was always a noisy spot.

Wang Dongyan’s three roommates appeared shortly after, tiredly pulling open the door and walking in.

Qiong Cang tidied up the desk, changed into her pajamas, and sat propped up on her bed.

If there was no case-related plot, the night would pass quickly.

The roommates piled their books on their beds and rested for a bit. Once they relaxed, they grew lively again, joking with each other as they took turns washing up for bed.

It was clear the three of them got along well, but despite sharing the room, none of them spoke to Qiong Cang.

They probably didn’t want to make it too obvious, but their averted gazes were so deliberate that Qiong Cang couldn’t ignore them.

In such a cramped space, they didn’t even glance in her direction.

But Wang Dongyan had indeed behaved very abnormally in the period leading up to her suicide, so it was no surprise she didn’t get along with her friends.

A normal Player would probably try to pry for information from the roommates and repair their relationship at this point. Qiong Cang had no such intention.

She pulled up her blanket and lay down.

Before long, the dorm lights went out.

Qiong Cang hadn’t slept much over the past two days anyway, and under the influence of the quiet environment, she actually started to feel sleepy. She closed her eyes, her consciousness drifting, unable to keep track of the passage of time.

She didn’t know how much time had passed, but in the quiet night, a strange sound suddenly broke the silence.

The sound was faint and rustling, starting off vague but gradually growing clearer.

The sleepiness Qiong Cang had just gathered was instantly dispelled by the irregular, growing noise.

She focused her mind and realized the sound was coming from right next to the foot of her bed.

It could be under the bed, or right by her feet. Or somewhere else nearby. The realization made her breath hitch.

It sounded like teeth grinding, though she couldn’t tell what materials were rubbing together to produce it. Under its cover, every tiny detail in the room was magnified and funneled into Qiong Cang’s senses.

Every minor sound brought a tense feeling that danger was closing in.

Qiong Cang slowly opened her eyes.

The dorm was very dark. The lights in the hallway had been turned off, but light still filtered in through the window.

It was a pale yellow light, cast by an unknown source, passing through the glass and projecting a shadow onto the security door.

From where Qiong Cang lay, she could see the mottled, humanoid shadow directly upon opening her eyes.

Startled, Qiong Cang felt the breath she hadn’t exhaled catch painfully in her chest.

The girl on the top bunk near the window suddenly whispered, “Are you guys asleep? Who’s grinding their teeth?”

One replied, “I’m awake.”

“Not me either.”

Qiong Cang remained silent.

After a moment, someone asked, “Hey? Dongyan, are you awake?”

Qiong Cang: “Yes.”

The moment she spoke, the sound in the corner paused unnaturally, then resumed with faster chewing and some creaking, swaying noises. It was practically screaming that the place was haunted.

That familiar sound was like a fuse, detonating a bomb that hadn’t exploded in years. Qiong Cang felt her adrenaline surge. Her heart raced, her blood pressure spiked, and the hairs on her arms stood on end. Her body fell into a state of intense fear.

The night became too deep in her eyes, enveloping the surrounding world like the mouth of an abyss, leaving no gaps.

Bizarre memories emerged from the corners of her mind, quickly taking over her vision and hearing.

The feeling of losing control—the thing she hated most—had returned.

In the darkness, Qiong Cang licked her lips, suppressing her emotions as she waited for the stiffness to pass, showing no outward sign of distress.

“Crap, what on earth is that sound?” The girl in the opposite bed hissed. “Dongyan, it’s right by you. Crawl over and take a look.”

“It’s not a ghost, is it?”

“I think it might be a mouse.”

One of them chuckled softly. “What ghost could be in our dorm? Even if there is one, it can only be Nan Song. We’re all sisters, why would she come out to scare us? Right, Dongyan?”

The conversation of the others pulled her out of her panic. Qiong Cang blinked hard.

“From a scientific perspective,” she said in a cool tone, “as long as you don’t touch it, it won’t come looking for you.”

Everyone was stunned. “Huh??”

A girl asked, “What kind of science is that?”

“Pseudoscience.” Qiong Cang’s voice grew even flatter. “Just like how some people believe ghosts actually exist in this world.”

The others were choked by her words and quieted down for a while.

Just then, the light outside the window suddenly changed color. It turned from pale yellow to red, and after flashing several times, it vanished completely.

Following this creepy turn of events, the girls took sharp breaths, wanting to scream. But because Qiong Cang remained so quiet and unresponsive, their performance fell flat, and they only managed a few awkward, insincere gasps.

An awkward atmosphere settled over the room. Combined with the squeaking sound of teeth grinding, it completely shattered the terrifying scene from moments ago.

Qiong Cang laughed out of sheer exasperation at her roommates.

Glancing out of the corner of her eye, she finally noticed the Suicide Progress on her character panel. In just a short span of time, it had surged from 87% to 92%, peaking at 95% before quickly dropping back down. Now, it was constantly fluctuating.

Great. Now she knew why Wang Dongyan had bought that stupid soul-soothing talisman⁴.

The girl in the opposite bed couldn’t stay quiet for long, calling out again, “Hey, Dongyan, Dongyan! Listen to me!”

Qiong Cang turned to face her.

The other girl suddenly switched on a flashlight, shining it upward to illuminate her face, which was framed by disheveled hair.

The girl tilted her head, shadows and light playing across her face. She said, “Why don’t we do palms up, palms down⁵? Whoever loses has to go out and check, how about it?”

The other two quickly agreed.

“Sure.”

“I… I guess so.”

“Dongyan, you said you aren’t afraid of ghosts anyway, right?”

Qiong Cang stared at the girl, motionless.

She wasn’t trying to create a scary atmosphere on purpose, but her face was pale, her expression haggard, and her lips almost entirely bloodless. Combined with her cold, dark gaze, the other girl immediately felt a chill under her intense stare and wanted to back down.

Qiong Cang threw off her blanket and sat up. The others were surprised by her boldness, thinking she was actually going to go out.

But Qiong Cang didn’t make any move to get up. She placed her hands on her knees, sitting upright. Adjusting her tone, she said calmly, “You want to choose someone? Palms up, palms down isn’t fair. If you three colluded beforehand, then the probability of choosing me to go out is one hundred percent.”

The girl raised her voice. “What do you mean by that?”

“It means I don’t trust you. Can’t you tell? Who do you think is the idiot here?” Qiong Cang sneered. “If you really want to choose someone, let’s use permutations and combinations. We’ll face off in pairs, one round to decide the winner. A win gets a point, a loss loses a point, and a draw gets zero. Whoever has the lowest score at the end goes. How about it? You can discuss how to cheat to give me a higher chance of getting the lowest score. This is basic high school math, it shouldn’t be too hard, right? I don’t mind taking a disadvantage, consider it compensation for your IQ. But, whoever goes out, let’s see if I’ll let you back in tonight.”

There was no hint of anger in Qiong Cang’s voice, yet no one doubted the threat behind her words.

She was absolutely serious.

No one spoke. The three of them seemed completely intimidated by the aura she exuded.

Qiong Cang patiently asked once more, “So none of you want to go?”

Silence.

Qiong Cang: “If you’re not going, then behave yourselves and stop playing these tricks.”

She walked to the foot of her bed, groped around under the mattress for a moment, and pulled out a small voice recorder. Just as she grabbed the device, the switch was remotely turned off.

Quiet finally returned to the dorm room, leaving only the sound of their tense breathing.

A cool breeze seemed to blow in through the crack in the window, sending a chill over everyone’s skin.

Qiong Cang gripped the device tightly, raised her arm, and hurled it directly at the opposite bed.

The object slammed into the wall with a loud crash, shattering into multiple pieces from the impact. The fragments bounced in all directions before scattering across the floor.

A scream rang out. The girl in the opposite bed panicked, but quickly realizing the lights were already out, she choked back the rest of her scream. She covered her mouth with her blanket, gasping in stifled breaths.

Qiong Cang brushed imaginary dust off her hands. “If anyone dares to do this again, for whatever reason, I’ll make sure she gets a close-up sniff of the toilet drain. Wouldn’t that be much more fun? What do you think?”

The sound of sobbing grew slightly louder, but no one dared to speak.

Wouldn’t it have been better to just listen in the first place? When it’s time to sleep, you should just sleep. Why grope around in the dark looking for the road to the underworld?

Qiong Cang pulled her blanket over herself and lay back down.

Translator’s Notes